Happy 1st Birthday my SWEET SWEET Pierce!

I am tearful and filled with joy all at the same time as I sit down to write this final blog post of the first year of your precious little life sweet Pierce. 

You son, continue to steal my heart. You are first and foremost the happiest most contented little baby I have ever met. Your joy fills up a room and even when you are getting in to every thing under the sun and I come down on you with a firm "Pierce!" you turn and smile at me with that knowing smile and toddle back over as you hug my leg and "give me love" as we like to say here in the Shipman house. You genuinely just love people. I can see even as a baby how the Lord has knit that deeply inside of you. I had been waiting to get this post up until I had your 1 year well check with all your stats. At the appointment you walked right over to the doctor, held your arms up and said "mamma" (which is now what you call everyone). Our favorite doctor quickly melted as she lifted you into her arms. You immediately went limp as she snuggled you, you seriously almost went to sleep on her as she rubbed your sweet little head and for about 10 awkward minutes she did absolutely nothing medical and simply soaked in your love. My heart melted. 

 

Weight: 23lbs 1.5 oz (81%) ....no surprise there!
Height: 29.75 in (46%)
Head: 46.3 cm (57%)

Sleep: You continue to sleep 12+ hours at night and unless you are sick we don’t hear a peep out of you. You seem to be on the cusp of transitioning from two naps to one long afternoon nap, but for now still take an hour nap in the morning from 10-11 and then a long afternoon nap from 1:30-4pm.

Eating: You really love it all (with the exception of birthday cake, but more on that later!)I call you our little disposal because you eat your food and then whatever Will doesn’t eat! You are fully adjusted to whole milk and we will begin to work on cutting out the bottles to just sippy cups. But for now you still take 3-4 bottles a day. You hate the milk cold so until you adjust I will continue to heat it up for your sweet self.

Milestones: You are running, running, running and babbling up a storm with new words added each day. You currently say, "Mamma, Dada, Ball, Dog, Ma (more) and Bye Bye". You wave to absolutely everyone. You love books and will sit through any/all the long books we read to Will. Your latest cute thing is that you toddle over to me or Zak bringing a book and immediately turn around and plop down, as if to say “Will you please read me this book!” It seriously happens 100 times a day and I absolutely love it. You continue to be our little dancing king as you love to hear music . You  have your top four middle teeth, bottom middle two and our currently cutting another on the bottom. You and Will are complete buddies and you imitate everything he does. You also seem to have a mischievous streak (just like your mamma) as you go for the one thing you know Will will care that you take and you take off running with it squealing with delight and it just makes me laugh.

 

                 You love to try to brush your own hair and attempt to brush mine.

You point at absolutely everything and talk and talk and talk! 

 

                   I love this hilarious face you make all the time with your little lips.

Pierce, I've said it once and I'll say it again, if they were all like you I could have 10 kids! We love you to the moon and back and you have completed our family this past year in ways we never knew we had been missing. I can't wait to watch you grow into the little man the Lord has designed you to be. 

Happy 11 Months sweet Pierce!

Pierce... these past 11 months of your life have absolutely flown by! How has this happened!?!? When I think about it, I know the answer. You son have been easy. Plain and simple. You are the sweet, laid back, fun loving, loveable second child that I always hoped for.

Right at 10 1/2 weeks you took your first steps and now you are literally running around the living room. One of your favorite things to do is have one of us chase you and you look back and squeal with delight! I absolutely love this stage. You are becoming increasingly more verbal with each day as you walk around the living room babbling away and pointing. I always try to conversationally respond as though I know what you are trying to tell me.

Your first word was "Mamma!" and you have since added Dada (only a few times), Ma (More), and ByeBye (as you wave). You also have started giving all your stuffed animals Love (Hugs) on command and us as well. It truly is the sweetest thing.

 

Your schedule hasn't changed much, you still go down at 7:30pm and wake up at 8am. You nap one hour in the morning (10-11am) and then go down again at 1:30-4:00 pm for your afternoon nap.  You still take 4 bottles and absolutely love your sippy cup of water. I am hopeful that our transition from the bottle to the sippy cup is a smooth one. I also just bought the last container of formula Praise God Hallelujah as we are just a few short weeks out from transitioning to whole milk !

 

 

 

Sweet baby Pierce, we are so incredibly in love with you and are so excited to see you grow into a little man! Your laugh is infectious and everyone who meets you loves you as you seal the deal by reaching out for them to hold you. I can't wait to celebrate your first birthday next month. We love you more than words could adequately express!

Happy 10 months baby Pierce!

Well... if you asked me how I would characterize this past month of life with you sweet Pierce, I would have to say challenging. You have been sick, sick, sick. You got sick Christmas Eve with a 104.6 fever followed by a cold  and now sick again. You have had an awful cold for the last 2 weeks that spiked into a fever last Sunday of 104 again. All to say posting your 10 months update has been low priority right now because snotty noses, coughing and crying aren't really the memories I was going for when documenting the first year of your life. But it certainly would have been a truer picture. You are still growing great and have been ear infection free for several months now but man are you busy. You are on the cusp of walking and with that you seem frustrated. You absolutely do not want to be contained or held and absolutely have a gift for finding the thing in the room that could cause immediate pain to your little body. You love cords, computers, remotes, eating paper that you have just found and of course whatever your big brother is playing with. I daily barricade you into the living room to maintain some sanity and you fly across the room to the gate and just lean over crying because I am in the kitchen and you WANT IN! All to say, I am exhausted and ready to move on to a new stage of your sweet life. 

Eating: Because of the bad cold you currently have you have been hit or miss with the solids. You still take about 5-6 oz in your bottles every 4 hours. You absolutely LOVE feeding yourself and try to knock the spoon away if we try to feed you. I basically give you whatever we are eating and you are super laid back about it. You have however started slinging food off your high chair and smashing it with your hand which is certainly a joy and opportunity for some early disciplining. Will's job in the afternoon is to take the hand held vacuum and clean up all your mess! He loves it and I appreciate it. Your favorite food currently is Tomatoes. You absolutely love them!

Sleeping: Honestly, you have always been a great sleeper with the exception of when you are sick. Your cough has been waking you up throughout the night, but in a well season you sleep like a champ so I cant complain. When I asked the pediatrician earlier this week why you kept getting sick she said preschool (all the germs Will is bringing home) combined with being mobile in the winter months. I am hopeful you are just building that immune system with each virus and will be a healthy little toddler here in a few months. Naps have been cut back to 1 hour in the morning and 1.5-2 hours in the afternoon because when I would let you take a long morning nap you seemed to want no part of the afternoon nap and that was just not going to work. I imagine you will be ready to drop that nap all together by 1 year.

 

Personality: You are the happiest little guy and continue to love everyone and everyone we meet LOVES you! You even reach for strangers to hold you! My sweet friendly baby boy. You are persistent and determined. All traits that I love in you. You wave to everyone but still no recognizable word just lots of baby talk and mimicking. Largely my fault as I always have you plugged up with your paci because otherwise you try to eat/chew everything (Like Will's shoes!). I am going to work on trying to leave it out this month so we can encourage talking more as you are not a loud little guy at all, but then again neither was your big brother. Oh, and I almost forgot you LOVE to dance. Anytime music comes on you just start dancing it absolutely melts my heart. I simply must get a video. You also calm right down anytime I sing to you. Such sweet memories.

You have 4 top teeth and two bottom teeth and seem to be in the never ending teething stage. It will be two more months before I know all your stats but I do know that as of Monday you weighed 21 lbs 10 oz which is honestly not much more than last month. 

I love you beyond words and even though you are in what I call a challenging stage you are still the perfect baby brother and we ALL love you more than you could possibly ever know!